


Marvel at the Flowers You'll Have Made

by moodlighting



Category: The Magicians (TV)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Angst with a Happy Ending, Catharsis, Friendship, Hanahaki Disease, Hurt/Comfort, Life-threatening Illness, Love Confessions, M/M, POV Alternating, Sick Character
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-05-30
Updated: 2019-06-14
Packaged: 2020-03-29 13:58:00
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 3
Words: 8,077
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/19021345
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/moodlighting/pseuds/moodlighting
Summary: Hanahaki Diseaseis a rare infectious disease of magical origin. The first and most common symptom reported by victims is the coughing up of flower petals (type varies). Though the onset of symptoms differs between victims, the infection rapidly progresses in severity following the first appearance of petals. The single known cause of Hanahaki Disease is unrequited love. The disease can be cured only when the victim’s beloved returns his or her romantic feelings, faithfully and without ulterior motivation(s). Should the victim’s affections remain one-sided, Hanahaki Disease will prove fatal in all cases. If the victim’s beloved is found to be unamenable to his or her feelings, medical intervention is essential. Surgical removal of the infection can alleviate all corresponding Hanahaki symptoms. However, it should be noted that upon excision of the infection, the victim’s romantic feelings for his or her love will also be eliminated. Proceed with due caution.[Excerpt taken fromArtificial Afflictions, Delphic Disorders, and Other Incurable Infirmities of Maladaptive Magic: A Reference Guide, 24th Ed., page 972. Available at the Underworld Branch of the Order of the Library of the Neitherlands]





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> I took a very loose approach to "canon," so any inconsistencies you may find were fully intentional on my part. We all know the show writers can't be trusted with a coherent plotline anyway :)
> 
> Title adapted from "No Plan" by Hozier
> 
> Inspired by [this](https://mooodlighting.tumblr.com/post/179806500905) prompt

A rose petal, delicate and red as wine, perfectly curled, fluttered onto the table in front of them.

Quentin’s chest ached, tender and bruised from weeks of this cough he couldn’t seem to shake. He pressed a hand firmly to his sternum. With his other hand, he wiped at his mouth and frowned down at his fingers - no blood, no sign of the petal’s origin. Alice was watching him carefully.

“Quentin?” she asked, worried.

“Five minutes out from Blackspire! Get your shit together, assholes!” they heard Margo shout from the other end of the Muntjac.

Quentin picked up the petal between cautious fingers, unsure what it would do to him, or where it came from - other than from _inside him_. Despite its source, it seemed to be a perfectly ordinary rose petal, fleshy and sweet-scented against his palm. He glanced up at Alice.

“Um. We don’t really have enough time to address...this,” he said slowly. “But can we agree that that was really weird?”

Alice nodded, looking pinched and anxious, more so than usual. “It could be your discipline finally coming through?” she offered, unconvincingly. “Maybe you’re a naturalist?”

That seemed unlikely.

Margo rounded the corner, arms full of supplies Quentin couldn’t even begin to identify, and promptly rounded on them. “Q, Alice, what the fuck?” she glared. “Come _on_.” She dumped half of her pile onto their table and marched off with the rest.

Quentin and Alice exchanged another look before grudgingly getting up to follow after her. Quentin tucked the single rose petal into the pocket of his jeans.

 

 

A week later, Brian pulled a single rose petal out of his pants pocket, wine red, delicately curled, perfectly unchanged. He smiled, perplexed, and chuckled to himself. _Where did that come from?_ He tipped the petal into the trash can on his way out of the bookstore, paper coffee cup warm in his other hand.

 

 

Quentin wasn’t aware he’d been gone until he came back to himself. All the things he knew and felt and remembered from a lifetime and a half rushed back to him in an instant. The totality, the urgency of it left him breathless. He stumbled back, heart pounding against his ribcage. He glanced desperately around himself, trying to figure out what was happening. His clothes were dirty and bloodied. He was in an unfamiliar woods, golden daylight shining all around him. Up against the nearest tree, Eliot had another man pinned by the throat. Quentin could see blood dripping onto the fallen leaves.

But that wasn’t Eliot. Quentin would know Eliot anywhere.

Quentin rushed forward, pressing a fist into his palm to start casting. Before he could even conjure the words for the spell, however, his lungs seized up inside him, hot and agonizing. Quentin fell to his knees. His fingers scrabbled at his chest, ugly wheezing sounds coming out of his mouth instead of the breaths he was trying to take. He couldn’t _breathe._

Quentin was choking, coughing and gasping as his body tried to expel whatever was twisted and burning inside him. He gagged once, his body convulsing, and with an awful ripping sound, a burst of rose petals flooded out of his mouth and onto the littered forest floor. Red, like another spill of blood.

From behind him, there was a thump, the sound of a body falling limp to the ground. Then, Eliot’s voice but not _Eliot_ called out happily, “Quentin, you’re back.”

Footsteps approached him, leaves crunching under a pair of boots. Long fingers trailed across Quentin’s shoulder, gentle and familiar and _wrong_. Quentin shuddered and tried to breathe, but his body was overtaken by another round of ravaging coughs. Quentin felt like he was dying, and maybe he was. He thought of Eliot and wished he was here.

Quentin remembered that feeling now too.

 

 

The Monster had gone away. To where, Quentin didn’t know, but for the first time in days, he was finally alone. He cornered Julia as quickly as he could find her.

“Something’s happening to me,” he whispered once they’d hidden themselves away in the nearest bathroom.

Either hearing the fear in his voice or seeing the panic setting in on Quentin’s face, Julia matched his urgency immediately. “What? What’s happening?” she gripped his arm gently. “Is it the Monster? Q? What’s in your hand?”

Quentin opened his fist above the sink, and a handful of the petals he’d choked out not ten minutes earlier fluttered into the basin. There’d been even more than the last time.

Julia stared down at them. She looked up. “Rose petals?” she asked. “Where did those come from?”

Quentin swallowed thickly. “From me. I’ve been coughing them up for weeks.”

“What the fuck,” Julia said, not a question. “What does that mean?”

Quentin shook his head. “I have no idea. But it fucking _hurts_. Jules, I don’t...I don't think I’m okay.”

Julia’s eyes searched his face. Quentin could see her concern for him, her love, as clear and familiar to him as if he were looking in a mirror. “When did it start? Do you think it’s the Monster doing it? Because we could always -”

“No, it was before him. Before, um...Brian, even. The first time it happened was on the Muntjac. On the way to Blackspire.”

For a long moment, they could only look at each other. There were no obvious answers, just more questions. Quentin hadn’t come to Julia for answers though - he just needed someone to know. To help. Everything Quentin was feeling, he could see reflected in Julia’s face. Mostly, the fear. Julia took a step forward and put her arms around him, bringing him close and holding him tight. “We’re going to figure this out, Q,” she said.

Quentin let his head fall against her. Tucking his cheek into the comforting warmth of her shoulder, he held Julia back in return. Quentin closed his eyes.

 

 

“I found something,” Alice announced.

Another life or death situation, another covert mission into the depths of the Library. Quentin had to wonder when it would all stop.

Alice set the book down on the coffee table in front of him and Julia. They were sitting close; Julia had hardly left his side since the week before. Every once in a while, she would reach across them both to adjust the blanket around Quentin’s shoulders, seemingly without consciously thinking about it. No matter how many layers they put on top of him, however, Quentin couldn’t stop shaking.

He hadn’t been able to eat in days. His lungs creaked in his chest with every shallow, painful breath he took. His mouth was sour, the taste of rose petals impossible to wash from his tongue. His skin felt tight and sallow. Every single part of Quentin ached.

In his lap, he clutched at the bucket that slowly filled each day with the petals that spilled endlessly from inside him. His throat was raw. It all hurt so much.

Their search for an explanation had yet to turn up any answers. Given the sheer size of the book Alice had found, they could only hope the solution was inside. They certainly wouldn’t find a bigger book anytime soon. Quentin read the title, embossed on the cover in lavish, cursive script: _Artificial Afflictions, Delphic Disorders, and Other Incurable Infirmities of Maladaptive Magic: A Reference Guide_.

Margo peered down at it from where she was leaning against the back of the couch, arms crossed, looking aloof. “Overkill,” she pronounced with a scoff. They all turned to look at her, and Margo’s eyebrows raised. “The alliteration. A bit much, don’t you think? This isn’t fuckin’ Potter World. So pretentious.”

Despite the state he was in, Quentin couldn’t help but smile. Alice sighed.

“Here,” she said. She opened the book at its middle, the front half of it dropping onto the tabletop with a heavy _thunk_. It appeared to be arranged alphabetically, like an encyclopedia. Alice quickly flipped through the pages like she knew what she was looking for. She stopped at the H’s. “Read this.”

She pointed to a shorter entry at the top of the page, and they all leaned in closer. Julia began reading out loud.

“‘Hanahaki Disease is a rare infectious disease of magical origin. The first and most common symptom reported by victims is the coughing up of flower petals. Type varies. Though the onset of symptoms differs between victims, the infection rapidly progresses in severity following the first appearance of petals. The single known cause of Hanahaki Disease is…unrequited love.’”

Quentin could feel it when everyone turned to stare at him, but he kept his own eyes fixed on the book, heart rate silently spiking in his chest. When he said nothing, Julia cleared her throat and continued to read. “‘The disease can be cured only when the victim’s beloved returns his or her romantic feelings, faithfully and without ulterior motivations. Should the victim’s affections remain one-sided, Hanahaki Disease will prove...’” A pause. Julia swallowed. “‘Fatal. In all cases.’”

She took in a deep, shaky breath. “‘If the victim’s beloved is found to be unamenable to his or her feelings, medical intervention is essential. Surgical removal of the infection can alleviate all corresponding Hanahaki symptoms. However, it should be noted that upon excision of the infection, the victim’s romantic feelings for his or her love will also be eliminated.’” Julia’s voice, having slowly quieted the longer she read, was barely a whisper as she finished the passage. “‘Proceed with due caution.’”

She sat back. Quentin stared blankly ahead. For a long moment, no one said a word.

Whatever relief might have been found in putting a name to Quentin's illness had been lost in the wake of the death sentence it immediately handed down to him.

Quentin didn’t know what to think, what to feel. He’d contemplated his own death before. Over the past few weeks too; he wasn’t so naïve as to assume that his body literally deteriorating in front of everyone could be anything other than potentially fatal. But to have it spoken out loud...

Quentin couldn’t comprehend it. He couldn’t fathom it.

He didn’t want to go. He didn’t want to die. He wasn’t ready - maybe never would be.

Quentin blinked. No one had said anything yet, but everyone was staring at Alice.

“Leave her alone. It's not -” he said, hoarse. He realized what they must all be thinking. No one else knew about -

Alice spoke up at the same time. “Don’t look at me,” she said defensively. “Quentin and I had that particular conversation months ago. We both know how we feel. This isn’t about me.”

Margo, predictably, was the first to lose patience.

“All right. Spill, Coldwater. I don’t care whose name you’ve got written in hearts all over your pretty pink Password Journal. Now is not the time for secret crushes.” Then, sighing heavily, like it was painful for her to admit it, “I guess you’re pretty lovable, so whoever it is will just have to...catch feelings before you kick the bucket. Tell us who it is, we’ll hitch a ride with 23, go pick them up, whether by force or -”

Quentin stopped listening. He knew who they needed, who _he_ needed, of course. But he hadn’t had the chance to follow the logic that far ahead yet. Now, it was abundantly clear how this was all going to end. The one person who could possibly save him was the one person they couldn’t reach. The one person they were already trying to save.

He really was going to die.

Quentin laughed, miserable and defeated. Based on how everyone else reacted, that wasn’t the response they’d expected from him.

It wasn’t a secret he’d kept on purpose. What he and Eliot had shared just never seemed all that relevant, especially given the other fires they were always trying to put out. It had never even happened, really.

There was no point in continuing to keep it a secret now. “It’s Eliot,” he admitted. It was easy for Quentin to say. Always had been.

He got a chorus of responses in return.

“ _Eliot?_ ”

“When did this happen?”

“Q, are you sure?”

“Fuck...”

Between petals and coughs, Quentin rasped his way through the shortest explanation he could manage. The Time Key, Fillory past, the Mosaic, fifty years. Coming back, remembering, asking, getting Eliot’s answer.

Margo groaned at that. “I’m going to wring his fucking neck,” she seethed.

By the time he’d gotten through it all, Quentin’s chest ached worse than it ever had before. When he braved a glance at his friends, an audience of eyes looked back at him, pained and captivated and gleaming with sympathy.

It was a good love story, after all. It just didn’t have a happy ending.

 

 

Quentin could hardly sit up. Most days, he never managed to leave his bed. He tried to sleep and almost always failed. Josh had baked a highly concentrated sleeping spell into one of his strains of edibles, and those seemed to do the trick, at least for a few hours. What little rest he did get was probably the only thing keeping Quentin sane. It was agony, being conscious.

The petals alone had been painful, but the thorns that came after were torture. Quentin was being ripped apart from the inside out. Soon, it was impossible to differentiate between the red pigment of the rose petals and the blood he coughed up alongside them.

He was almost never alone, but for the most part, everyone’s efforts had been refocused on getting Eliot back. There was nothing left they could do for Quentin; rescuing Eliot had become a mission to save them both. Part of Quentin hated that. Saving Eliot should have been important enough on its own. It was _Eliot_. The fact that Quentin’s life now hung in the balance too shouldn’t have made overcoming the Monster any more urgent.

But the other part of Quentin just wanted Eliot back. Simply and selfishly. He missed him. Even...even if Eliot couldn’t save him, Quentin still wanted to see him, before.

He made sure Julia was the only one who knew. Quentin trusted her to go through with it, at the right time. On one of his more lucid days, as she sat by his bedside, gripping his hand as he writhed in pain, Quentin told her.

“When you get Eliot back, if he doesn’t...if it doesn’t work. And if I’m not...okay enough to say so. Cut it out of me,” Quentin said. He held her gaze steadily. “I don’t want to die, Jules.”

Quentin watched the single tear fall down her cheek, and he hated that too. Julia wiped it away with the back of her hand.

“Q, I wouldn’t...I wouldn’t say this if the situation wasn’t so…” She made a frustrated sound and averted her eyes to the ceiling, trying to keep more tears at bay. “I’m not trying to be cruel, Q. But you’re _dying_. And Eliot...I’m sorry, but he already gave you his answer. I don’t understand why you want to wait for him, when there’s a chance it might not even work. We could call Professor Lipson today and this could all be over,” Julia said. She grasped Quentin’s hand even tighter in her own, trying to pass along even an ounce her conviction, her desperation to save him. “You don’t want to die, but you’re risking so much, waiting for Eliot. _I don’t want to lose you_.”

Any attempt to explain his faith in Eliot would betray a lot more of Eliot’s heart than it would of Quentin’s. And it wasn’t Quentin’s place to expose all of those tender, unseen parts of Eliot he had been entrusted with a lifetime ago. But there was another truth he could offer Julia.

Teddy, Arielle. He hadn’t included them in the shortened explanation he’d given everyone else. They’d wanted to understand his love for Eliot, and he'd given them that. But it was only a third of the story. Even as his heart wilted and broke apart inside him, there remained pieces that, for Quentin, were still sacred and whole and belonged to him and Eliot alone, with everything unspoken between them.

“We had a son,” is what he murmured to Julia, after a long pause. She frowned down at him, surprised and tearful and scared. “In Fillory. I had a wife. And a son. Eliot and I...we had a family. I know it sounds...complicated. But it was so easy, Jules. The happiest I’ve ever been.”

Quentin felt a tear of his own gather at the corner of his lashes and fall. It was the first time he’d spoken about them since he and Eliot had remembered.

“It never happened though. They don’t exist. The whole timeline was erased when Margo got the Time Key and stopped us from going.” Julia gasped, wounded. Quentin shook his head. “Not her fault. It had to happen. But Arielle and Teddy - those were their names. Everything...everything Eliot and I shared. He’s all I have left. You have to understand...so much of what I feel, and, and _remember_ about them is all tied up in what I feel for Eliot. It was... _ours_. And I'm afraid if I lose that, lose him. Cut him out...”

Quentin clutched at his heart, where he hurt the most, and choked out a sob. It quickly devolved into the deep, hollow coughs that left him breathless and spitting blood by the time they abated.

Julia’s hands hovered over him as he shook, held him as he cried out in pain, but there was nothing she could do. They were both openly weeping by the time Quentin was able to meet her eyes. When he found the strength to continue, he spoke again.

“I love him,” was all Quentin said. His voice was ragged, nearly gone now, but so, so sure. “So if there’s even a chance, a _chance_ that Eliot feels the same. I won’t risk losing all of that. Him, or - or our family. Not...not until I don’t have a choice anymore.”

Julia nodded fiercely as the tears fell down her face. They understood each other now, completely. Quentin would wait for Eliot, and Julia would wait with him. And if she had to, she would make the call, just like Quentin had asked her to.

Julia laid herself gently down alongside him, clutching him close. When Quentin let his eyes fall shut, cheek resting against her soft hair, he didn’t open them again for a long, long time.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Part two up soon! Eliot and "Happy Ending" are both tagged for a reason - no false advertising here, I promise <3


	2. Chapter 2

Eliot was aware he’d been gone, not in control of his body, but coming back to himself was still dizzying. All the things he knew and felt and remembered from a lifetime and a half rushed back to him in an instant. The totality, the urgency of it left him breathless. He stumbled back, heart pounding against his ribcage. Searching dazedly around himself, Eliot tried to put together what the hell was going on. His clothes, repulsive as they were - a problem for later - were dirty and bloodied. He was in an unfamiliar woods. The sunlight was dim, bluish-green as it filtered through the treetops above. Across from where he stood, Margo and Penny-23 were crouched facing him, battle-ready, looking furious and wary and terrified.

Eliot had never seen his Bambi so distressed. He was about to call out to her, reach out and comfort her, when he caught sight of the axes clutched in her hands.

Oh right. He’d just been stabbed.

He remembered that it had hurt, and felt it then too. Searing hot pain pulsed through Eliot’s shoulder. He stumbled back another two steps, reaching up to feel where the axe had punctured through flesh and muscle. When he pulled his hand back, it was covered in blood, dark and dripping. He pressed his palm flat against the wound to try to stanch the bleeding.

“ _Ow_ ,” he said emphatically, glaring between both Penny and Margo.

Margo lowered her axes. “...Eliot?” she asked cautiously.

“Yeah, it’s me,” Eliot replied. With his free hand, he pointed an accusing finger at her. “You stabbed me, you _bitch!_ Like first year all over again!”

Then Eliot was laughing, and Margo was laughing too. She threw down her axes, abandoning them on the littered forest floor so she could throw herself at Eliot. Eliot caught her and swept her up with his one available arm, the other trapped in the middle of their desperate hug.

“You absolute _dipshit-ass_ ,” Margo berated him, holding him as tightly as she could. Her feet dangled helplessly between his legs. They both knew she was crying into his shoulder, but Eliot didn’t say a word.

“So sweet,” Eliot crooned. “I knew you missed me, Bambi.”

“I’d kiss you right now if I knew the last time that thing brushed your damn teeth,” Margo said.

Eliot laughed again. Gently, he lowered her to the ground and took a small step back. God, what a marvelous sight she was.

Margo wiped her cheeks free of any tears that may or may not have fallen. She stared up at Eliot with happy, shining eyes. “Fuck,” she declared succinctly, with a laugh.

Eliot grinned down at her. They probably looked like idiots. Penny-23 was surely rolling his eyes behind them.

But the joy evaporated as quickly as it had burst between them. Suddenly, Margo’s smile dropped from her face, as if she’d just made a devastating realization. Her lips parted, eyes widening in fear. Eliot had every single one of Margo’s expressions catalogued, and this one made his breath catch in his throat.

“What?” Eliot asked, voice low and anxious. He put his hand on her shoulder. “What’s the matter? Margo?”

Margo ignored him. Taking his hand in a vice grip, she bolted in Penny-23’s direction, tugging Eliot along by the sheer force of her will. She looked back at him only once to say, “It’s Quentin.”

Eliot went cold. His heart fell in his chest like a stone.

 

 

Eliot read from the effusively titled book Alice had found as they bandaged and bound his shoulder. Julia, Alice, and Margo attempted to brief him on all that occurred since the Monster took control of his body. They described what had happened to Quentin, and what he could expect to find, what he should prepare to see on the other side of Q’s bedroom door.

Alice squeezed his hand encouragingly. Margo held him and gave him a lingering kiss on the cheek. Then it was only Eliot, Julia, and the turn of a doorknob separating them from Quentin.

“You’re sure about this?” Julia was watching him carefully.

Her eyes were red-rimmed, her face swollen and vulnerable from crying. She looked completely shattered. Julia had been watching her best friend die for weeks on end; Eliot didn’t know how she was even upright. And still, she was offering Eliot so much kindness.

“You’re not angry with me.”

Eliot wasn’t asking, because it wasn’t a question. She wasn’t angry with him, that much was obvious. Eliot just couldn’t understand _why_. Everything that had happened to Quentin was unequivocally his fault. Given the number of wrenching looks and averted gazes he’d been on the receiving end of, it was clear everyone knew. Even the fucking book would be pointing fingers at him, if it had the hands to do so.

Julia shook her head. “Margo’s in charge of cussing you out. We delegated,” she said with a sad smile. It disappeared too quickly. There was a pause as Julia’s eyes wandered to the bedroom door across from them. “I don’t know everything that happened between the two of you, but Quentin...he believed in you. That means a lot, you know.”

Eliot did know, now better than ever before.

“But he - um. There’s probably not enough time for both you and Lipson,” Julia said. Her eyes were glistening when she looked at Eliot again. “So if you can’t...if you aren’t…”

Her voice trailed off. Eliot understood what she was asking. He took her hand; Julia’s fingers were cold in his palm.

“Julia, if there’s one thing I’m sure of, it’s him,” Eliot said. “I already messed this up once. I won’t do it again.”

Julia didn’t reply. For a long moment, her eyes simply searched Eliot’s face. He held her gaze unwaveringly. Then, having found what she was looking for, or perhaps just taking assurance in whatever she saw in him, Julia nodded quickly and took a step back. She let their hands unclasp and fall between them.

Eliot nodded too. Then he stepped forward, turned the doorknob, and walked into Quentin’s bedroom.

 

 

Nothing could have prepared Eliot to see Quentin like this.

Q had always had gentle delicacy about him, but not once would Eliot have described him as fragile. Quentin was brave, and solid, and warm. Not gaunt and unmoving as he was now, lost among the bedsheets. Even at his lowest, Quentin had always been so wonderfully, restlessly _alive_. Now he wasn’t moving, utterly still. Eyes shut, barely even breathing.

Eliot all but fell into the chair next to Quentin’s bedside when he reached it, his trembling legs unable to hold him up any longer. He didn’t want to look any closer; what he’d seen was already too much to take in. He wanted to bury his face in his hands and sob.

But Eliot refused to run away from this again. He looked at Quentin and saw everything.

Quentin’s lips were pale, tinted blue. Because he wasn’t getting enough oxygen. Alice had told him that. Quentin was drowning in his own body, chest cavity slowly filling with rose petals. Dark red flecks circled his mouth. Because Quentin hadn’t stopped coughing up blood for the last six days. Julia had told him that. The rose thorns were tearing him apart, the organs inside him. Stomach. Lungs.

Quentin’s heart.

It was the worst magic Eliot had ever seen.

The room smelled overwhelmingly of stale blood and rotting flowers. Margo had said that early on, the petals didn’t change at all. No matter how long they were outside Quentin’s body, they remained perfectly full and red as if they’d just blossomed from the stem. It was when they started shriveling up, turning brown and decaying in hours that they’d known Quentin was running out of time.

There were dead petals scattered across the bed. With shaking hands, Eliot roughly swept them away from Quentin, onto the floor and out of sight. Clenching his eyes shut, he took several long, shuddering breaths, trying to stave off the panic. He blindly reached out to find Quentin’s hand, which Eliot took in both of his own. It was cold - colder than even Julia’s had been.

A sob escaped Eliot’s chest, raw and broken. He curled in on himself, bowing forward until his forehead rested against their joined hands. If anyone were to walk in and see him, they might think he was praying.

Eliot felt a single tear slip down his cheek. He’d never felt less capable in his life, or more terrified.

“God, Q,” Eliot gasped out. “I have some very vulnerable things to say to you but you’re not here to help me. What am I supposed to do?”

Eliot laughed weakly, though he'd never felt less like laughing. When he was able to look up again, his eyes found Quentin.

“You were always the brave one. Never afraid to be honest with me, with how you felt. I used to think that was so unbelievable,” Eliot told him. “Not even a hint of subterfuge about you. You were just honest with yourself. That - that’s never been me.”

With the back of his hand, Eliot brushed the fallen tear from his chin.

“I’m not like you. I’m not...true,” he said. “You, though. You made me braver. Better.”

For a long moment, Eliot paused, like he would if he were waiting for Quentin to answer.

Quentin’s face remained unmoving. Still, Eliot couldn’t look away. He watched Quentin and saw every feature, every facet of him that Eliot held dear. He knew Quentin by heart.

“Could’ve made a real honest man out of me, Q,” Eliot told him softly. Then, even quieter, “Maybe you did.”

Eliot drew in a deep, fortifying breath. The words from the book rang in his ears. _The disease can be cured only when the victim’s beloved returns his feelings, faithfully and without ulterior motivation._ Maybe Eliot did begin to pray then, that wherever Quentin was, he could hear him, and see his heart in return.

“I love you,” Eliot said simply. They were the easiest and most honest words he could find. A confession. “I’m in love with you. I never said it enough. Not before, when I might have had a right to. And definitely not after.

“I fucked up, Q. I was afraid of losing you, of wanting too much. But doing what I did just made everything worse,” Eliot said.

He only had to look down at Quentin to see all that his cowardice had created. Eliot held Quentin’s hand as tight as he could. He had to make sure he _knew_.

With everything inside him, everything he believed, Eliot said, “I was so wrong. Your life is more important to me than anything I could ever be afraid of, Quentin.”

Wherever the words were flowing from, in whatever part of his heart they were taking shape and spilling out, Eliot couldn’t stop them now. “I’d like to marry you. I've thought about it a lot,” he said. Another tear fell. “You asked me, before. ‘Because it would be good for Teddy,’ you said. So practical. But I’d already gotten in the habit of turning you down by then.

“Sabotaging my own happiness might be the worst of my many vices, but it’s fucking...unconscionable that I made you a part of that, Q. You deserve every happiness in the world,” Eliot said. “And I’m sorry, for whatever part I played in taking away your happiness too. For everything I said and did without thinking of how it would affect you. And our life. You and Teddy were always my first thought. Every morning, I swear. But sometimes I got selfish.

“We’ll get married this time,” Eliot promised, squeezing Quentin’s hand. “And not just so we don’t confuse our kid. We’ll do it because we’re in love, and Julia and Bambi deserve to be our best bitches and stand next to us and look at us like we’re stupid for not getting there sooner. And because we want the tax benefits. And because Obama gave us the right, and I know you don’t want to let him down,” Eliot said. “And if you were awake right now, you’d correct me and tell me all about the freedoms we owe to the female justices of the Supreme Court and the last great liberal majority, or whatever the fuck. And Quentin, I just -”

Eliot took an unsteady breath. “I think you’re the love of my goddamn life.”

For all the words he had spoken, every unfettered truth that had tumbled out of Eliot’s mouth, nothing in the room had changed. Nothing was happening. Quentin was still lying there, dying in front of him. Eliot was panicking, scared and heartsick tears falling freely now. _He was running out of time._

“Tell me what you need me to say,” Eliot begged, desperate. He didn’t even know who he was asking. He reached up and began to stroke his fingers though Quentin’s hair in shaky starts and stops. “ _Please_. I know I haven’t earned your forgiveness, Q, but I’d like the chance to try, and I can’t do that if _you’re not here with me_.”

Eliot felt it then, the shift in ambient magic. With an almost imperceptible _pop_ , like an unexpected drop in air pressure, everything around them shifted. Eliot’s sobs immediately caught in his throat. He pulled away from Quentin slightly, sitting up straighter in the chair. His eyes darted around the room. Every rose petal had disappeared. Every brown, red, ugly reminder of the life they were slowly draining, vanished.

Eliot whipped his head back around to look at Quentin. The blood was gone from around his mouth. His skin was still pale and sunken, but growing brighter already. A healthy pink flush spread across his cheeks. His breath no longer trickled weakly out of his lungs in rattling gasps, but came in long, even exhales, his chest rising and falling fully and comfortably.

Quentin began to stir in place; Eliot’s heart leapt, pounding so hard he could feel the beat of it in his throat.

Time moved in slow motion as Quentin’s lashes fluttered and gradually lifted. Eyes barely open, Quentin slowly took in his surroundings, bleary gaze surveying the entire room before finally landing on Eliot. For a long beat, he simply stared up at him. Then:

“You’re such an asshole,” Quentin croaked.

Like the strings of tension holding him up had been cut, Eliot collapsed forward onto the bed. He landed face-first somewhere close to Quentin’s knees.

“ _Oh my god_ ,” he gasped out, breathless.

He collected himself almost immediately. Sitting up, Eliot scrambled to get all of his long, uncooperative limbs onto the bed so he could gather as much of Quentin into his arms as he could, roughly and without restraint. Quentin made a small _oof_ sound when he landed against Eliot’s chest. Eliot clutched him as tight as he possibly could, holding nothing back.

Quentin felt impossibly weak in his arms. Eliot could feel his ribs, could feel the faint tremors shivering through his body, could feel the effort it took just for Quentin to reach up and grasp at Eliot’s back. He had to twist his fingers into the fabric of Eliot’s shirt to keep his arms from falling back down.

The roses were gone. Quentin was cured. Left ill by all that he endured, but so, so _alive._ Eliot choked out a sound, somewhere between a laugh and a sob, his mouth and tears hot against Quentin’s collarbone.

Slowly turning his head, Quentin brought his cheek to rest against Eliot’s shoulder. He carefully tucked his face into the warm curve of his neck.

“Could’ve told me all that before,” he mumbled, voice soft and muzzy. Eliot could feel his chapped lips moving against his skin. “Would’ve saved me a lot of trouble.”

Eliot cupped the back of Quentin’s head in his palm, fingers tangling in his hair, holding him even closer. “ _I’m so sorry,_ ” he said.

He pulled away, just enough so that they could look at each other. Quentin would see his tears, but Eliot didn’t care. He stroked his fingers across Quentin’s cheeks, holding his face tenderly in his hands. “You idiot,” Eliot said. He leaned in, just once, because he couldn’t help it, to press a kiss to the corner of Quentin’s mouth. “ _Why did you wait?_ ”

Quentin shrugged limply. Eliot’s hands seemed to be the only thing keeping him upright. “I had a plan. Ask Julia, she was going to call -”

Eliot shook his head. “I know about the _‘plan.’_ You shouldn’t have even waited that long, Q. You almost _died_. You couldn’t have possibly known when I’d be back. You were risking your life, and you didn’t even know that I -” Eliot gulped. “If I could save you.”

Eliot refused to consider what might’ve happened if Quentin had waited too long. He could hardly bear to imagine it, yet the image raced to the forefront of his mind before Eliot could stop it. Quentin’s lifeless body surrounded by rotting petals, having died of a fucking magical broken heart, all because Eliot had been too scared to take the chance he’d been offered. Too scared to love Quentin, wholly and truly.

It was unfathomable. It was one misstep away from being exactly how all this had ended.

“But I did know,” Quentin said quietly, interrupting Eliot’s thoughts, drawing his attention back to him. The white, unseeing eyes Eliot had conjured in his mind were gone in an instant, replaced instead with the warm brown eyes before him now. Bright and attentive and _alive_ as Quentin gazed at Eliot, unblinking.

Brave. Always brave.

“Because I know you,” Quentin said then. “I know why you run, and where you go to hide. Didn’t even take me fifty years to figure it out. You’re not as hard a read as you think you are, El.

Startled, Eliot opened his mouth and promptly shut it again. He didn’t know what to say, or how to react; wisely, he said nothing at all.

“The monster possession, and the, uh, the near death experience I didn't see coming,” Quentin said. “But I knew. I knew you'd find your way back, eventually. Or, um. I hoped so, at least.”

He took in Eliot’s lost, searching expression and continued. Softly, Quentin said, “You always stayed. In Fillory. Even when it stopped being fun, and it was just our life. You just - kept loving me.” He said it like it was the simplest thing in the world. “That’s not nothing. That is a choice, even if you said it wasn’t.”

“You’re right, of course you’re right,” Eliot said. He shook his head; he still didn’t understand. “But if you knew...if you knew how I felt, then why did you get sick? The book, the book said it had to be unrequited -”

Quentin watched him sadly. “Eliot, _I_ believed you loved me,” he murmured. “You were the one who didn’t.”

All of the breath punched out of Eliot’s lungs when the realization came. It knocked the wind completely out of him, like he’d just fallen from a great height.

“And you still can’t even say it to my face,” Quentin went on. Using what little strength he had, he reached up to touch Eliot’s cheek. “But it’s okay now, El. I heard you. I love you. You can stop running.”

Eliot didn’t think he had tears left to cry, but at Quentin’s words, another sob wrenched out of him. He felt utterly powerless against the feeling when it overcame him. He felt seen, and known.

Loved.

Eliot took the chance he'd been given.

Cradling Quentin’s face in his hands, thumbs stroking delicately across his cheeks, Eliot leaned in and softly pressed his mouth to Quentin’s.

Eliot had experienced no shortage of good kisses across his lifetime and a half, but as Quentin tilted his head just so, bringing them even closer together, Eliot marveled at how no other kiss came close to the feeling contained in this one. It was chaste, nothing more than a warm press of lips, yet so full of naked devotion and trust and  _relief_ that Eliot felt entirely lost to it. He wondered how he would ever be able to satisfy this new, overwhelming need to be close, closer, _closer_. He was completely engulfed by it. He wanted to pull Quentin inside his body and settle him right next to his heart where he belonged. He wanted to open up his ribcage and let out the enormity of emotion he felt inside, no matter what the consequence, so he could finally take a breath.

Eliot took a breath.

Their lips parted. Quentin made a small wanting noise and blinked open his eyes, peering up at Eliot. Eliot brushed a second, smaller kiss to the corner of his mouth.

Pressing their foreheads together, Eliot gazed back at Quentin, open, earnest, and present. “I love you,” he whispered into the space between them. Not with fear, or hesitation. Just three quiet words belonging to them alone.

Quentin smiled, eyes drifting shut again. "I love you too," he whispered back.

And Eliot breathed out.

As carefully as he could then, Eliot folded Quentin back into his arms, gathering him in close. 

Quentin needed to heal. Eliot needed a haircut. Together, they needed to digest all that had been said and discuss what was left unspoken between them. They would have plenty of time for that later, however; another lifetime's worth, even. First, they would rest.

Quentin sighed, drained. He slumped entirely against Eliot, trusting him to hold his weight. Arms wound loosely around Eliot's waist, he let his head fall and rest safely against his shoulder.

“No roses at the wedding, ‘kay?” he mumbled, words all but lost to the side of Eliot's neck.

Eliot pressed his lips to the top of Quentin’s head for a long moment before replying. “I've always hated roses,” was all he said.

Quentin just laughed. Kneeling together, chest to chest, they held onto one another and didn't let go.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I have an epilogue that didn't quite fit here in part two, so I'll be posting a short third chapter as soon as I finish writing it <3


	3. Epilogue

The apartment Julia shared with Quentin was small and filled with light. It was nothing special by New York standards: two bedrooms, a kitchenette, a chipped claw-foot tub in the bathroom and barely enough room for a couch, but it had always served her and Quentin's purposes well enough. It also had a balcony about the size of a postage stamp, with just enough space for the tiny table and bistro chairs that Julia, Quentin, and Eliot had hauled up all eight flights of stairs at the beginning of the summer.

The balcony was where Eliot found them that morning.

“Good morning,” he greeted as he stepped out into the sunlight, pulling the sliding door shut behind him.

Julia sat perched on Quentin’s knees, an oversized cup of tea between her palms. Quentin had his arms circled loosely around her middle, hugging himself to her, his cheek resting against her back as they chatted. Neither one of them had thought to get up when Eliot let himself into their apartment.

They both turned in unison to peer up at him.

“Hey,” Quentin said. Julia could feel him smiling against her back.

“Morning, El,” Julia replied happily.

Eliot was all but a permanent fixture in their apartment. Once, Julia had wondered aloud why Q hadn’t just moved in with Eliot instead of staying with her in their old undergrad haunt. In response, Eliot and Quentin had both done some very oblique hand waving and made a vague excuse about already having taken things out of order once before. Julia had left it at that. After all they’d gone through recently, she was more than grateful to keep Quentin at her side a little while longer. And Eliot was always welcome in their home.

Quentin and Eliot were happy together, happier than Julia had ever seen either of them. She was only just beginning to know Eliot, of course, but the difference in Q was obvious. He was so...content. Settled in a way that clearly spoke of the decades of history and comfort and familiarity between the two of them. From the outside, the enormity of it all was hard to parse. Julia couldn't even begin to imagine what it must be like for them, living with an entire lifetime already in their heads. It eased some of the worry in Julia’s heart though, knowing they had each other.

Sometimes, when she got up to fetch a glass of water late at night, she would find Quentin and Eliot still curled up together on the couch, talking quietly about their family and Fillory and everything they’d shared. Most of the time they didn’t even notice Julia as she silently passed by, so caught up in one another.

Settling into the chair next to them, Eliot draped his long legs over the armrest, making himself comfortable. Julia would never admit it to Eliot’s face, but she thought it was impressive how he could make any regular piece of furniture look like a throne just by sitting on his ass.

“I got something for you on the way over,” Eliot told Quentin.

Quentin raised his eyebrows at him. “Oh?”

From where he’d hidden it behind his back, Eliot presented Quentin with the most pathetic looking succulent Julia had ever seen, sad and wilted in its tiny terra cotta pot.

“Some guy was selling plants on the corner,” Eliot explained. “I picked out the ugliest, most tragic looking one I could find. Heartbreaking, isn’t it?”

Quentin reached around Julia to take the plant from him. With the dirty little pot in both of his hands, he beamed up at Eliot, grinning in that way that made his eyes crinkle so deeply they almost disappeared. It was infectious; Julia couldn’t help but smile too.

“How thoughtful,” Quentin laughed.

Quentin had developed something of a freakish, verging on miraculous green thumb after he’d recovered from Hanahaki Disease - an unexpected side effect of whatever magic he’d absorbed during his illness. He’d never been good at growing things before, so despite his near death-by-plants experience, Quentin had happily invested himself in his newfound talent. Coaxing things grow in soil was much easier than growing flowers in his chest anyway, he said.

Over the last several months, their apartment had slowly filled with greenery of all shapes and sizes. Quentin tended to avoid flowering plants, but there were still plenty of trailing vines and leafy ferns available for him to distribute across every flat surface in the apartment. Penny-23 had remarked that their place was starting to look like a Rainforest Café the last time he’d visited. Nevertheless, the next time he stopped by, he brought along some exotic fig tree he'd found, which he'd promptly deposited into Quentin’s arms without ceremony.

“Did you know fig trees don’t flower on the outside?” was the only thing Penny said.

Julia thought it was all very sweet.

“I need to get my sprayer,” Quentin muttered to himself, frowning down at his newest succulent.

Julia laughed quietly. She knew Q would have the plant mended and back to its fullest, lushest life within the week. Taking the hint, she said, “I was about to head inside anyway,” and stood up from Quentin's lap with a long stretch.

Freed from their chair, Quentin got up and wandered into the apartment, mumbling something about sandy loam as he went. Eliot watched him go, then tipped his head back to look up at Julia.

“Any new leads?” he asked her, shielding his eyes from the sun with the flat of his hand.

“Nothing big,” Julia reported. “A few things worth looking into though.”

Eliot just nodded. “You’ll let me know if there’s anything I can do to help?”

Julia smiled softly. Among all their friends, Eliot seemed to be the one who best understood Julia’s need to continue the search for her goddesshood on her own. Though he always offered his help, he never pushed, never needled. She appreciated that a lot. 

“Of course,” Julia said. Bending down, she brushed a kiss against Eliot’s cheek. He smiled, eyes falling shut. “Enjoy the rest of your morning, El.”

Julia could hear Quentin rummaging through the kitchen, still in search of his spray bottle as she gathered everything she needed for the day. With the promise of a hot summer day lingering in the humid air, she changed into something light and worked her hair into a braid. By the time she made it back to the kitchen to fill her water bottle, Quentin was gone again, but the small succulent was left sitting on the ledge above the sink. Its pot had been wiped clean and the soil inside looked rich and wet. Already, the little plant seemed to be turning a brighter shade of green around the edges of its waxy leaves.

Grabbing her keys from the key bowl, Julia paused on her way to the door to glance out onto the balcony. Eliot was still lounging in his seat, bare feet propped up on the opposite chair, the embodiment of a carefree summer day. Quentin had his hands braced against the arms of Eliot’s chair, hovering over him as they spoke. Julia watched as Eliot tilted his chin up at him, like a challenge, or an invitation. She saw Quentin smile as he leaned in the rest of the way to press his lips against Eliot’s, giving him the kiss he’d obviously been looking for.

Julia smiled to herself. Quietly, she made her way out of the apartment, leaving them to each other and the late morning sun. Neither Julia nor anyone else needed goddess powers for this; Quentin and Eliot were healing all on their own.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Credit where credit is due - I stole the Rainforest Café joke from Jenna Marbles' plant tour video. Thank you Mz. Jenna.

**Author's Note:**

> Thank you so much for reading! <3
> 
> [fic post](https://mooodlighting.tumblr.com/post/185237456400/marvel-at-the-flowers-youll-have-made)


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